Doozzoo Revolutionizes Online Music Education with Vonage Technology

In the afternoon, Stefan sits alone in his living room in front of his laptop and plays his acoustic guitar. From his laptop comes the voice of his music teacher, "You've become faster in this passage - and make sure you play the quarter notes legato.” 

What used to be impossible or difficult to realize is now possible thanks to doozzoo: Online music lessons at the highest level in best video and especially audio quality with all the necessary music learning tools - a blessing, not only in times of the pandemic.

Of course, teachers and students have long had the ability to arrange virtual lessons online, but the poor sound quality of the leading off-the-shelf video solutions didn’t deliver a true experience. This is because conventional web and video conferencing products are primarily optimized for speech and not for the sound of instruments or singing. Extreme delays, echo and noise filters on these platforms tend to alter the sound beyond recognition.

The heart of the doozzoo solution: the Vonage Video API

doozzoo takes a different approach to virtual music education, attaching great importance to sound quality. 

"Our solution has an optimized sound, transmitting voice as clearly as instruments by delivering the full frequency range," explains doozzoo CEO and co-founder Thomas Gier. "This is extremely important, because otherwise you can't recognize the sounds properly. We deliberately chose the Vonage Video API because it allows more access to audio settings and other parameters, which significantly improves the sound. With the ability to be embedded right within our existing education platform, the Vonage Video API is the core of the doozzoo e-learning solution. It enables us to continue to provide our students with uninterrupted musical education - even during these difficult times when face-to-face lessons aren’t an option.”

Vonage solutions offer many other advantages in addition to optimal picture and sound quality. The most important of which is that the platform is purely browser-based. This means there is no need to install software - everything runs via the browser after creating a doozzoo account in the cloud. The Vonage Video API also abstracts the key WebRTC functions in a way that ensures cross-browser and cross-device compatibility (e.g. for iOS mobile devices under Safari) while providing detailed access to all audio parameters. These parameters include, for example, audio bitrate settings, which meet even the highest professional requirements. 

"The Vonage Video API offers excellent compatibility with our Angular8+ architecture and is very well documented," says Christoph Pelz, co-founder and developer at doozzoo. "From a developer's point of view, it is very convenient - you can work quickly with the framework."

"Vonage's globally scalable infrastructure provides a stable foundation for our international customers," Pelz continues. "Vonage's Video API not only provides the technical prerequisites for high-quality video and audio connections, it also makes them tangible. This allows us to enable high bit-rates and stereo, for example, and to easily connect our web audio tools to the Video API.”

Web audio tools are programs that can be easily linked with the Vonage API. "The simple and stable integration of the Vonage API with other services has enabled us to combine the extensive functionality into a streamlined workflow," explains Thomas Gier.  

Smooth teaching process

doozzoo is made by musicians for musicians. With the Vonage Video API, the workflow has been tailored to the special requirements of online music teaching, which also sets doozzoo apart from common web conferencing programs. Everything is easy - just like in real face-to-face music lessons. The result is a virtual music classroom where all processes are tailored to music lessons. Added Gier, "This pays off especially when you work with the system for a longer period of time and have to manage large amounts of teaching material and many students."

The intuitive user interface has all the tools and the relevant teaching material directly at hand. With just one click you can display sheet music, switch on a metronome or play audio files. The local latency compensation makes it possible to let the student playback without delay and thus assess his timing. In addition, teachers and students can record their sessions and play them back at any time to work more effectively and improve skills. All files are directly available, even offline outside the live connections. Students can always find their files and sheet music in their inboxes and can use all tools directly in the browser while practicing. They carry virtually the entire practice room with them at all times.

The possibilities of the doozzoo platform are comprehensive. Group sessions with several students including multi-screen sharing are also possible. "The teacher can remotely control the entire room of students, display the notes, even call up tools, play the metronome or an audio file and let the students play along with it," says Thomas Gier. From the developer's point of view, Pelz concludes: "The API has saved us a lot of time that we would otherwise have invested in ensuring cross-browser compatibility. Furthermore, we found it particularly easy to integrate the archiving function."

doozzoo is used worldwide by private individual teachers, music schools and various music academies for professional teaching. The overwhelmingly extremely positive customer feedback speaks for itself.

Stefan is no longer sitting in his living room, but has now retired to his study with his laptop and guitar. He doesn't want to disturb his girlfriend, who wants to relax in front of the TV after a long day at work. Online music lessons have never been easier and more flexible for teachers and students.